He is Professor of “History of Folk Traditions” and of “European Ethnology” at Palermo University. He is President of the Ignazio Buttitta Foundation and General Secretary of the Association for the Conservation of Popular Traditions. He has conducted several fieldworks in Sicily, Sardinia, Calabria, Corsica and Crete producing an extensive documentation, including audio-visual and photographic. His main research interests are the study of popular religion in Southern Italy and in the Mediterranean area with particular attention to the ceremonial symbolism, its functions and meanings in relation to the socio-economic conditions and their change, as well as to material culture and ethno-anthropological museums. Among his books: Verità e menzogna dei simboli (Roma, Meltemi, 2008); Continuità delle forme e mutamento dei sensi. Ricerche e analisi sul simbolismo festivi (Acireale- Roma, Bonanno 2013); La danza di Ares. Forme e funzioni delle danze armate (Acireale Roma, Bonanno 2014).

Birgit Heidsiek
Birgit Heidsiek, graduated in Political Science, works as film journalist and critic for the German magazine of cinema Filmecho Filmwoche and the European online platform Cineuropa, as well as for the daily newspaper Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger. Furthermore, she is the Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Green Film Shooting magazine and of its website, developed in 2012, for the promotion of sustainability in the world of cinema and media. She teaches also in the Department of Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Technical Journalism at the Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences and she is a member of the Faculty.

Alessandro Negrini
Multi award-winning film director, born in Turin, he defines himself a “Film Director by mistake”. He has spent most of the 90s travelling around Europe and writing. In 2001 he has moved to Ireland. Negrini’s most acclaimed work deals with social exclusion, magic realism and resistance and his works combine documentaries, fiction and poetry. His multi award-winning documentary Paradiso has won 18 international awards, being nominated in more than 60 film festivals around the world. Defined as “documentary of poetry”, his last movie Tides – a History of Lives and Dreams Lost and Found (Some broken) has won, since its release, 11 international awards including the Honorable Mention Award as “Best Documentary” at the “Mediterranean Film Festival” in Bosnia Herzegovina, “Best Screenplay Award” at the “Tehran Documentary Festival”, “Special Mention” as “Best Movie” at the “Milan Film Festival”, “Best Documentary” in competition at “Malta International Film Festival” and “Best Photography” at “Sole Luna Doc Film Festival” of Palermo. He has collaborated with the BBC and with screenwriters such as David Wingate (Screenwriter for “Fucking Amal”), David Gothard (former artistic director of Riverside Studios in London and of the Abbey Theater, Dublin) and Michael Seeber (“A Good American”).

Ingrid Rossellini
Born and raised in Italy, she has been living in New York for over 30 years. After the Ph.D. in Italian Literature from Columbia University (in 1990), she has taught Literature and Italian Cinema for several years in different universities such as New York University, Princeton and Harvard. She wrote: Nel «trapassar del segno». Idoli della mente ed echi della vita nei «Rerum vulgarium fragmenta» (Olschki 1995), and Know Thyself: Western Identity from Classical Greece to the Renaissance (Doubleday 2018).

Nima Sarvestani
The award-winning director Nima Sarvestani started his career as a journalist in Iran and has been concentrating on documentary filmmaking since moving to Sweden in 1984. He founded his own film production company, “Nimafilm Productions”, in 1992. Having over 20 years of experience in directing and producing documentary films for cinema and television, he is one of the most experienced documentary filmmakers in Sweden today. He is well-known for enlightening tough topics such as human rights and social justice interesting for the ordinary viewer. Among the films he has directed: The Evil Cycle (1998), Naked and Wind (2002), Dead Man’s Guest (2003), Iranian Kidney Bargain Sale (2006), On the Border of Desperation (2008), I Was Worth 50 Sheep (2010), No Burqas Behind Bars (2012) Those Who Said No (2014), Prison Sisters (2016). His latest production is the feature documentary Stronger than a Bullet (2017).HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS JURYLiceo Scientifico Statale Albert Einstein, Palermo Classe III A
Coordinated by: Fabio D’Agati
Jury members: Alberto Anzalone, Gaetano Dario Bonello, Valentino Bonfanti, Martina Rossella, Cangemi Morreale, Elisa Ciulla, Ernesto Andrea Di Gregorio, Giorgio Di Marco, Hamza El Guendy, Francesco Galioto, Alberto Ginestra, Davide Lo Cicero, Alessia Mercadante, Allegra Rosaria Pantano, Juvan Pathmaraja, Luca Pellitteri, Salvatore Emanuele Petitto, Silvia Petitto, Luigi Piccilli, Marco Rosato,
Giorgia Scalici, Federico Francesco Sperandeo, Roberto Maria Tocco, Marco Troia, Alessandro Vullo.